The Consequences of Verbally Abusive Athletic Coaches

My 10-year-old son was bullied recently. He was told that he was an “embarrassment.” He was told to “shut up.” He was yelled at and scolded in a tone of voice tinged with disgust and disdain. He was told he would be punished for any mistakes he or his peers made in the future.

Surprisingly, this didn’t happen at school. The bully wasn’t even a peer of his. The bully was his swim coach, a young lady of perhaps 26. She was desperately trying to motivate her swimmers to swim fast in the big meet the next day. And this was her attempt at motivation.

In speaking to the lady in charge of the coaches on this swim team, it quickly became apparent that this type of “incentive” was not only okay with her, it was actually encouraged. She said that 9- and 10-year-old boys were “squirrelly” and “needed to be taken down a notch.” She was in full support of her coaches yelling at, embarrassing and insulting young children to motivate them to swim faster. “That’s just the way swimming is,” she said. Had I not spent 12 years of my childhood swimming competitively, I may have believed her.

How Do I Know if My Coach Is a Bully?

To determine if a coach is a bully, you must first know what bullying behavior looks and feels like.

Bullying is aggressive behavior that occurs repeatedly over time in a relationship where there is an imbalance of power or strength. Bullying can take many forms, including physical violence, verbal abuse, social manipulation and attacks on property. Physical violence is not usually a component of a coaching relationship. If your coach is physically violent with an athlete, call the authorities.

Verbal and emotional abuse is much more common in athletics. It can lead to severe and long-lasting effects on the athlete’s social and emotional development. In a world where “more is better” in terms of training and “no pain means no gain,” there is a great deal of machismo in coaches. Most coaches coach the same way that they were coached while playing the sport growing up. This means that many coaches are still operating as if the training methods used in the Soviet Union in the 1970s are state of the art. “Ve vill deprive you of food until you win gold medal.” Central to this old school mindset is the idea that threat, intimidation, fear, guilt, shame, and name-calling are all viable ways to push athletes to excel.

News flash: None of these is a worthwhile motivator for anyone. These are the bricks which line the road paved to burnout, rebellion and hatred of a once-loved sport.

What Does Verbal and Emotional Abuse Look Like in Athletics?

Usually, this involves a coach telling an athlete or making him or her feel that he or she is worthless, despised, inadequate, or valued only as a result of his or her athletic performance. Such messages are not conveyed merely with the spoken word. They are conveyed by tone of voice, body language, facial expression and withdrawal of physical or emotional support.

This is a large part of why bullying in athletics is so hard to quantify: A clear definition of bullying is somewhat elusive. Even if we can define it, as above, it’s highly difficult to measure.

Bullying is partly defined by the athlete’s subjective experience. In other words, if the athlete feels shamed, frightened, or anxious around the coach due to his or her constant shouting, name-calling or threatening, then the label “emotional abuse” is warranted.

How Widespread Is Bullying by Athletic Coaches?

There are no hard and fast figures on coaches who bully. In school, we know that 90 percent of 4th through 8th graders report being victims of some form of bullying at some point in their past. In a 2005 UCLA study, Jaana Juvonen found that nearly 50 percent of 6th graders reported being the victim of bullying in the preceding five-day period.

In general, boys are more physically aggressive (physical bullying), whereas girls rely more on social exclusion, teasing, and cliques (verbal or emotional bullying).

In 2006, Stuart Twemlow, MD gave an anonymous survey to 116 teachers at seven elementary schools, and found that 45 percent of teachers admitted to having bullied a student in the past. In the study, teacher bullying was defined as “using power to punish, manipulate, or disparage a student beyond what would be a reasonable disciplinary procedure.”

Psychological research has debunked several myths associated with bullying, including one that states bullies usually are the most unpopular students in school. A 2000 study by psychologist Philip Rodkin, Ph.D and colleagues involving fourth- through sixth-grade boys found that highly aggressive boys may be among the most popular and socially connected children in elementary classrooms, as seen by their peers and teachers.

Another myth is that bullies are anxious and self-doubting individuals who bully to compensate for their low self-esteem. However, there is no support for such a view. Most bullies have average or better than average self-esteem. Many bullies are relatively popular and have “henchmen” who help with their bullying behaviors.

And so it is with the swim team that supports the coach’s bullying. Bullying does not take place in a vacuum. There has to be an environment around bullying behavior which allows it and enables it to survive.

We know that bullying is rampant among children as well as adults. We know that 45 percent of teachers admit to having bullied a student in the past. On average, teachers have more training (1 to 2 years postgraduate) in areas such as child development and educational and motivational theories than the average youth athletic coach. So it appears safe to assume that teachers are less likely than the average coach to engage in bullying. Assuming that’s the case, it seems safe to assume that roughly 45 to 50 percent of coaches have bullied an athlete in their past.

According to the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, there are approximately 2.5 million adults in the United States each year who volunteer their time to coach. Using our tentative number of 50 percent would mean that there are roughly 1.25 million adult coaches who have bullied a child athlete in the past. And this number does not even take into account coaches who are paid for their services and who may be more likely to bully due to the pressures and expectations placed upon them.